Editing – why can’t I have the un-edited photographs?

25th May 2013

We often have people ask for the unedited images from a photoshoot.

Our answer is no. The reason for this is that we shoot in RAW. This is an uncompressed, very high density file but the image held within it is flat. This essentially means that the image is untuned. All the vital information is there but there has been no contrast applied, no bolstering of colour, the image is dense but in it’s raw state, pretty unuseable. It would be like giving you a garden that has been left for 10 years, until it is sculpted and trimmed, the weeds removed and the borders defined, the garden will just look a mess.

We tune every image before it leaves us, we make sure there is a consistency of exposure, colour balance, contrast and saturation and then go on to refine the image by removing any specs of dust if that’s appropriate or (as happened once) a fly that managed to invade a photograph… there are all manner of things that make an image that final item. If you think this is just something we do now, check this link… even editors in the early days did it with film images…